domingo, 2 de junio de 2013

Acquisition of EMBRAER airplanes by CONVIASA should be investigated

This is a revised, shorter version in English of my post in Spanish, below in this blog

The order for 20
Embraer 190 airplanes was placed last year by Venezuelan national airlines CONVIASA. It was reported at the time in the local Venezuelan press
(my translation): “EFE news agency,
Caracas, October 17. CONVIASA will expand its international routes this year,
from four to ten, by using three of the twenty airplanes already on order from
Brazil. The announcement was made by the president of the airlines, General
Cesar Martinez. He said that the cost of the acquisition for the three first
airplanes was $270 million”.At the time
I commented on this announcement in a Venezuelan website, www.analitica.com, in October 20, 2012, as follows: “ A report,
http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/aviation-international-news/2012-08-02/farnborough-international-report-2012 tells us that Brazilian company Embraer just
sold Hebei Airlines, from China, five Embraer 190 airplanes for $223 million,
this is, about $44,6 million for each airplane”. I added that, according to the
president of CONVIASA, the cost to Venezuela of the same equipment was some $90
million per airplane, more than double the cost to the Chinese. I also said that
this significant overpricing should be investigated. An overprice of some $40 million per airplane amounts to $800 million for the whole order, an enormous amount of money that should be accounted for.